Jomon period: content
The Beginnings of Jomon (up to Incipient Jomon) - in progress
The Developments of Pottery - in progress
Occupation of space by the Jomon people - in progress
Subsistence strategies during Jomon - in progress
Everyday life of the Jomon people - in progress
The spiritual landscape and culture of the Jomon - in progress
The last stages of Jomon and the Yayoi transition - in construction
Jomon period: The Development of pottery
Text in progress
It is not known for sure at this point where pottery first developed in the world. Nor do we know how it came to be in Eastern Asia for sure, although people there had certainly some idea of the properties of clay and and how to use it before making vessels from it. What we do know is that it is in Japan that the oldest pottery remains dated (potsherds from the Odai Yamamoto I site, Aomori prefecture (northern Honshu): 14,500 BC calibrated) have been discovered so far. Claims of pottery almost as old as this are being examined both in China and Siberia. Until we get the results though, or until we make new discoveries susceptibles to shed light on the matter, it is difficult to ascertain the origins of pottery making. It is also possible that it has multiple origins, and/or that similar technologies have developed simultaneously in several places of Eastern Asia
Why bother so much about pottery anyway? It's not the only innovation that happens around that time. And while we're making such a big deal of the first appearance of pottery, its beginnings probably weren't felt as earth-shattering, life-changing to them even if would be of great consequences to the cultural development of all the people who would use it. But to us it is important because fired pottery is one of the most likely items to turn up when digging a site as, like stone, it would have many more chances to survive to this day, waiting to be unearthed by an archaeologist, than organic matter which wasn't specifically processed (foodstuff, wood, etc). The rapid succession of styles helps us establish a certain chronology and facilitates the establishement of cultural ties between sites. And in the case of Japan in particular, the main focus since the early days of archaeology has been to establish the most accurate pottery chronology possible, in a bid to go from the very detailed (pottery chronology) to the broader view (Jomon society as a whole), an approach which differs completely from that of Western archaeologists
The importance of pottery in Japanese archaeology is also symbolized by the very name Jomon as the most common type of pottery, and first to be discovered in the second half of the 19th century during the first scientific archaeological excavation conducted in Japan, is also what gave the name to the period. Jomon means indeed "cord-marked", a common decoration which consists in the impression of twisted cord on the clay.
Jomon pottery is clearly the most well-known feature of that time. This doesn't mean however, that the Jomon period is exclusively determined by its existence. During quite a long time, it was considered that the term Jomon, as name to a period in Japanese history (or rather, here, Japanese prehistory), should apply to the period during which cord-impressed ware was produced. But with the discovery of cord-impressed pottery associated with full-scale agriculture, which situates it in the subsequent Yayoi period, and pottery sherds bearing different types of decoration, or none at all (as is the case for the Odai Yamamto I site pottery recovered), and which clearly dated back well before 10,000 BC (and therefore earlier than what was thought to be the beginning of the Jomon period), the question was asked as to what should be the limits of the Jomon period. The question has been the source of considerable disagreements among scholars, and that for a long time, in particular since the radiocarbon datation of the Fukui Cave (Sugao Yamanouchi, in particular, dismissed the dates, believing they couldn't possibly apply to pottery created in Japan). The consensus today places the beginning of the Jomon period to 11,000 BC: however, this date doesn't reflect what calibration and the latest discoveries have revealed, namely that pottery was produced in Japan as early as 14,500 BC, albeit in small quantities. Why is that? It's not so much that a majority of archaeologists don't agree today that Jomon should begin with the first pottery (in particular since the oldest, plain pottery found at Odai Yamamoto in the Layers III and IV were found with what seems to be arrowheads, characteristic of the Jomon toolkit [1]); instead, it illustrates the reluctance of Japanese archaeology to apply calibration - and in fact, to a certain extent, radiocarbon dating - and that even today. As a result, the number of radiocarbon data is relatively small compared to the mass of material evidence unearthed so far, and whatever dates available are often innacurate [1][2]
At that time, even though pottery was in its infancy, it is amazing to note that potters, which are believed to have been in majority women due to the fact that some of the vessels would have required small hands to be made, went to considerable trouble to make rather complicated shapes. During the Incipient Jomon, two types of shapes were quickly popular: deep pots with round base and square shape with flat base. The latter is much more difficult and time-consuming to do, yet they were produced in great quantities alongside the easier round deep pots. It is believed that both were inspired by familiar items, not just in terms of shapes but also in terms of decorative patterns. Such items could have been animal skin bags and woven baskets. The more time-consuming and therefore less efficient flat base disappeared however at the onset of the Initial Jomon. Also, decoration didn't necessarily reflect other existing material anymore. Kobayashi Tatsuo [3] considers that this means that potters were beginning to experiment with pottery in its own rights, detaching themselves from the other real life items that had inspired them during the Incipient Jomon
A major change occured at the beginning of the Early Jomon which saw a diversification of purposes: if vessels had been used until then mostly to cook food, the Early Jomon pottery proposed a much greater variety of backed clay items, including storage jars and serving dishes. This departure can also be seen in the decoration: if it was rather discreet during the previous period, the surface of vessels were now divided into zones, some with light motifs serving as background to other bearing impressive decorations; the technics became more diversified as well
Another major stage of development , as highlighted by Kobayashi (2004), is reached during the Middle Jomon. For one, pottery became associated not only with food, but also with other everyday activities, burials and almost certainly with ritual ceremonies. Two major changes in terms of decoration happened around the same time: one was that some types of decoration became standardized and some motifs probably took on a distinctive meaning, which would have given combination of motifs particular meanings. These narrative qualities reveal that potters by then didn't just set up to create an item, but would develop an entire concept in their mind with symbolic values that could be understood within their community. This apogee of the pottery interestingly intervened at the same time as the climax of the Jomon culture as a whole, with the Middle Jomon seeing the most important figures in terms of number and size of settlements, and thus, it is inferred, of population [4]
The subsequent Late and Final Jomon see important changes. Up to this point, chemical analysis has revealed that pottery was essentially produced locally, but in those later stages, the first results seem to indicate that it wasn't necessarily the case anymore (Habu, 2004: 212-213). Also, when it comes to pottery style zones, Japan became divided in two: in eastern Japan appeared a coarse pottery (almost exclusively deep bowls) alongside a fine pottery taking various shapes. The former usually shows more signs of wear and is believed to have been used for everyday purpose, while the latter was probably dedicated to ceremonies. These wares were, it seems, developed in the archipelago. On the other hand, weatern Japan was very much following a different route, with a simplification of the vessels' decoration to the point that, in the beginning of the Final Jomon, the coarser, unburnished deep bowls tended to bear no decoration, while the finer, burnished shallow bowls were still decorated. Overall, western Japan pottery shows clear influence from the continent, and more specifically Korea, and looked closer to the following Yayoi pottery than to its eastern Japan counterpart at that time then
[1] Habu, Junko "Ancient Jomon of Japan"
[2] Keally, Charles T, "Fakery at the beginning, the ending and the middle of the Jomon period"
[3] in Kobayashi Tatsuo, "Jomon Reflections" (see bibliography)
[4] in Imamura Keiji, "Prehistoric Japan"